


Just Words

by LadyRazzle (crimegimp)



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Captain America: The First Avenger, Pre-Serum Steve Rogers, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Teenagers being cute, otherwise canon-adherent, with an angst garnish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-15
Updated: 2014-10-15
Packaged: 2018-02-21 07:03:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2459180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crimegimp/pseuds/LadyRazzle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by that now legendary post: "soulmate AU where you wake up on your 18th birthday with the first words your soulmate will say to you tattooed on your body so you’ll know them when you meet them." Well what if they appear the moment you turn 18, rather than just the day? And what if by the time you turn 18, you'd already fallen in love? </p><p>Bucky wasn’t eager to discover what the words said. He already knew what he wanted them to say. He always had.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Words

Bucky woke to a prickling sensation, like a skewer scratching over his skin. His hand flew to the small of his back, making to smack away whatever was causing him injury, but before his fingers even finished the journey he knew it was futile. He knew what the pain was, and all he could do was press his hand to the skin over his hip as the words etched themselves into his flesh. He gritted his teeth, waiting for the pain to pass. He didn’t need to look at the clock to know it was half past seven in the morning, give or take. He was precisely eighteen years old, and this was his gift. 

“You writing an essay back there?” he asked under his breath. His parents had warned him; _‘it hurts, _’ they said,_ ‘but it’s a fine pain, and it goes quick. And then you know.’ _

From the minutes after her belly had prickled on her eighteenth birthday, Bucky’s mother had been waiting for someone to say _‘May I help you heft your case, miss?’_ causing her to respond with the immortal _‘Oh, my sweet heavens,’_ as was inscribed forever on his father’s forearm. 

A final scratch and the pain subsided. He traced his fingertips over raised and tender skin, but the pain itself was already fading. He withdrew his touch and stared out of the window, listening to the city come awake. 

A few minutes later, there was a battering at his door. Years of experience stopped him starting at the noise. 

“You can come in,” he called, barely parting with the words before his little sister was through the door and on top of his blankets. 

“Happy Birthday,” Rebecca said in a sing-song voice. She planted a noisy kiss on his cheek. 

“Gee, thanks,” he replied, making a show of wiping his hand across his cheek. 

“Get up; Mom’s got a big breakfast going. She made French toast.” 

“Really?” Bucky asked, his eyes lighting up. He grabbed a shirt and waved it, shooing her out of the room so he could change out of his pyjamas. She tilted her head at him instead. 

“Did you get your words?” she asked, squinting at his arms and neck for obvious marks. 

“Yeah, they’re on my back,” he said. 

“Well, let’s see ‘em!” she said, making a grab for his shirt. 

“No,” he said, smacking her hand away. “I haven’t read them yet.” 

“You haven’t read them?” she asked. “I’d wanna know right away, if it was me.” 

“Well, it’s not you,” Bucky said, about as firm as he ever got with her. “I’ll read them in my own time. You’ll get your own.” 

“Not for four whole years,” she protested. “I can’t believe you’re not excited.” She looked distressed. “You do _have_ them, right? I mean, you’re not...” 

There were names for people who didn’t get words. Sad names, sympathetic names. They even had groups, you could find advertisements for them in the paper – people who weren’t to have a soulmate, but could maybe find someone to be happy with. It wasn’t like having the words was a guarantee - everyone knew a sad story of a distant cousin or an aunt twice removed, whose first words to their soulmate were also their last – of people inscribed with _‘I’m not going to make it, am I?’_ and _‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.’_

“Yeah, Bec, they’re there,” he said. “I just wanna wait.” 

She pouted in a last-ditch attempt to get her way. But her pout, formidable as it was, had never been a match for her brother’s, and she admitted defeat. 

“I’ll tell mom you’ll be down,” she said, flouncing from the room with characteristic Barnes flair. Show-offs, the lot of them. Bucky didn’t know how he’d managed to escape inheriting that trait. 

He ate his breakfast and teased his sister, as their mother drank coffee and watched them fondly. When he was finished, he thanked her like he always did, and told her it had been delicious. 

“You’re a good boy,” she said, laying her hand on the back of his. “We’ve got you a gift, it’s not much, but...” 

“Mom, it’s fine,” he said, laying his hand over hers. “You didn’t have to.” 

“Do you mind waiting until your father gets home?” she asked. “He’d like to be here when you open it.” 

“‘Course not,” Bucky replied. His mother stood up and got the sugar tin from the larder. 

“We saved a little bit of extra money,” she went on, popping the lid off and extracting a small pile of dollars, which she folded into his hand. “Thought you and Steve could go get shakes, or go to Coney Island if you want.” 

“Wow, Mom, really?” he asked. She nodded, smiling. “Thanks, mom,” he said, leaning over to give her a kiss on the cheek. 

“Oh, take me with you!” Rebecca asked as he hurried to the back door to pull on his boots. 

“Bec, Bucky can spend the day with who he wants,” their mother interjected. 

“At least show me your words!” she insisted, as he straightened up. 

“Later,” he said, kissing her on the top of her head. He all but leapt out of the door, bounding down the back stairs to a day of freedom. 

It wasn’t that Rebecca was unusually keen. Most people were eager as hell to know what the fates had decided to scrawl upon them, even if it meant next to nothing to them at that time. It was a favourite playground game, writing insults on a friend’s exposed limb to threaten them with a foul-mouthed or degenerate soulmate. Teenage girls (and boys, to be sure, but so much more in private) would scrawl _‘Pleased to meet you, I’m...’_ followed by the name of whatever movie star they desired, and imagine how the moment of meeting would go. They’d be introduced, and as their first words left their lips the object of their affections would recognise them and sweep their soulmate up into their arms. 

Bucky wasn’t like them. Bucky wasn’t eager to discover what the words said. He already knew what he wanted them to say. He always had.

And yet when he got to Steve’s house, he found himself unable to form the words. Instead he made a few moments’ pleasant conversation with Steve’s mom before sweeping his friend away for a day on the rides and the promise of cotton candy. He didn’t mention the words at all. 

“I can’t believe you made me ride the cyclone,” Steve complained for at least the tenth time. Bucky grinned as he shut the front door behind himself. The hook on the adjacent wall that held Sarah's work hat and coat was empty. 

“Well, it’s my birthday, you have to do what I want,” Bucky pointed out, again. 

“And who came up with that stupid rule?” Steve asked, a smile pinching at the corner of his mouth. 

“Some little pain in my ass,” Bucky replied, hands coming up as Steve turned and leaned into his embrace. He wrapped his arms around Bucky’s neck and hung against his chest. 

“Rules are rules,” Steve said in mock defeat. “What else do you want to do?” 

With his best smile, Bucky leaned in, squeezing Steve against himself and kissing him. He pulled Steve up a little, and Steve made a low noise of satisfaction, humming contentedly into Bucky’s kiss. He would tolerate nobody else in the world picking him off his feet or drawing any attention to his lack of bulk, but with Bucky it was a prelude to the welcome sacrifice of all control. 

They inched backward across the kitchen until the back of Steve’s legs hit the little kitchen table. Bucky’s arms tightened, lifting him up higher to place him down on the edge of the table. Steve spread his legs, pulling Bucky forward to stand between them without so much as breaking the kiss. He moved one hand down to Bucky’s waist, dragging it slowly up the side where he knew Bucky to be ticklish, splaying his hand so his fingertips came up to brush Bucky’s nipple beneath his shirt. 

“I thought we were going to eat,” Bucky said, his lips still brushing Steve’s. 

“After,” Steve said, breathing the word against Bucky’s tongue. He made short work of the buttons on Bucky’s shirt, and pulled the front of the shirt out of Bucky’s trousers. His hands slid across the bare skin of Bucky’s waist as Bucky debauched him with hungry, sucking kisses on the delicate skin of his neck. Steve let his head loll back, eyes closed and breathing shallow. Determined to drag Bucky closer, to grind their bodies together for a little relief, he moved his hands toward the small of Bucky’s back. 

Bucky tore himself away and took a step back. 

“Buck? What’s wrong?” 

“Nothing, I just...” he rubbed a hand over his face, sighing to glance at the bruises reddening on Steve’s collarbones. Bucky grabbed a chair and turned it around, straddling the seat to keep a barrier between himself and the object of temptation. “It’s my eighteenth, Stevie,” he said. 

“Yeah, I noticed,” Steve replied. “So what are you...?” He lifted his chin. “You got your words already.” Bucky nodded. “I thought maybe you were born later, they just hadn’t come yet.” Bucky shook his head. 

“No, they came this morning.”

“Does it hurt as much as they say?” Steve asked after a moment.

“Yeah,” Bucky said. “Doesn’t hurt now, though.” 

Steve stared at him for a while, his expression inscrutable. Then he slid off the table, rubbing at his neck where Bucky’s kisses still lay wet against his skin. He retrieved a large pot, the sound of clanging crass and loud in the quiet kitchen, and filled it with water. Bucky watched him as he hefted the now heavy pan over to the stove. He didn’t turn on the burner yet, just stared down at the water with his arms braced on the edge of the counter. 

“Can you tell anything?” Steve asked quietly. “Like, just... anything about him... or her?” 

“I think so,” Bucky said. “I mean, sometimes. You can get a kind of impression.”

“I know _people_ can,” Steve said, his voice clipped. “Can you?” 

“What? I...” Bucky stuttered for a moment. “I don’t know, I haven’t looked yet.” 

Steve whirled around. 

“You haven’t _looked_? Damn it, Buck, I thought you were trying to tell me something!” 

“No, I just didn’t look because...” 

“You scared the hell out of me.” 

“Because I’m scared.” 

Steve looked taken aback. 

“Of what? You know what it’s going to say.” 

“What if it doesn’t, though? What if it says something else, what if we’re wrong...?” 

“We’re not, you dummy,” Steve reassured him, coming to stand in front of his chair. “Besides, I don’t care what it says. Even if the universe doesn’t think it’s us, I know it’s us.” He leaned his forehead against Bucky’s, who sighed and let his eyes close softly. “I couldn’t ever love someone more than I love you,” Steve went on. “My heart would collapse if I tried. It’s fit to burst with you as it is.” 

“We’re young,” Bucky said. “Maybe you’re going to change your mind.” 

“Are you?” Steve said, his voice tinged with the familiar seed of temper when anyone challenged his convictions. Bucky looked up, forcing Steve’s head back so their eyes could meet. 

“No,” he said softly. “Never.” 

Steve lifted his face with a hand at his jaw, and kissed him softly. They kissed slowly, in languid promises, and Bucky barely felt Steve pushing his shirt from his shoulders, until the fabric began to gather at his elbows. 

“Steve,” he whispered against Steve’s lips, only to be immediately shushed. Steve held the shirt down as Bucky reluctantly drew his arms from the sleeves. With a final kiss, Steve drew away, stroking a slow path over Bucky’s jaw and neck as Steve walked around behind his friend. Bucky’s torso heaved with anxious breaths as Steve pressed a kiss to the back of his neck, then another high up between his shoulders. His fingers stroked down Bucky’s spine and Bucky heard him taking a steadying breath of his own before he took a step back and looked down. 

There was a moment of silence. 

“Steve?” 

Steve traced the lines on Bucky’s back, no longer swollen or painful but still present – still discernibly different. 

“Steve, what does it say?” 

Steve rested his forehead between Bucky’s shoulders, breath whispering down his spine. 

“You mind if I sit by you?” Steve whispered. Bucky’s breath stuttered. 

“Is that what it says? Truly?” he asked, fighting to keep his voice from cracking. 

“Those are your words, Buck,” Steve said, straightening. “You wanna look in the mirror?” 

“No,” Bucky said, getting off the chair and swinging around to gather Steve into his arms. “I believe you, I believe you.” 

“You’re an idiot,” Steve said fondly, scraping his fingers through Bucky’s hair. Bucky looked up at him through his eyelashes. 

“I know,” he said, big hands pulling Steve flush against his chest. He splayed his fingers, guiding Steve down onto his lap. “I know that,” was a whisper against Steve’s smile a moment before they came together. Steve sighed into the kiss, melting into Bucky’s embrace in a private admission of weakness, and slid his hand around Bucky’s waist to press his fingers against the permanent fixture there. 

In another four months, in the middle of a lazy Sunday afternoon, Steve would hiss in pain and leap up from where his head lay in Bucky’s lap. His arm would burn, like Bucky’s back, until the words “You got it, Pal,” stood vivid against the near-translucent crook of his elbow. And Bucky would kiss them and kiss them and read them out loud with his lips against them until the tickle overwhelmed Steve and he had to shove Bucky away, giggling. Then Bucky would kiss him and kiss him and say the words against his lips. 

In the present, as they kissed, Bucky remembered the scrawny little thing who had approached Bucky’s bench at school, asking to sit by him, his voice equal parts anxiety and determination. Even now Bucky could recall not knowing if refusal would lead to tears or a feeble but honest punch to the arm. Something had swollen in him at that moment, a need to protect and a desire to needle. It was a feeling he’d not managed to shake in a decade, a feeling that had grown and settled and become a habit and a comfort, something integral to his being. But even in that moment, before he knew anything about anything, when all he had was a scrawny stranger and a casual request, he knew ‘no’ had never been an option.


End file.
